Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer Fatal1ty Professional Series

Advantages: Great Dolby/DTS decoder, excellent sound quality and gaming audio
Disadvantages: expensive

...This is the X-Fi Fatal1ty FPS endorsed by professional gamer Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel. X-Fi Fatal1ty FPS also features a glowing Fatal1ty logo on the soundcard and drive bay(!!!!!!).Err, ok, moving on.... First up, whats included in the package. You get the card, a 5.25 inch drive bay with various audio inputs and outputs which I wil detail later, and a remote that can be used to make changes to volume and other functions, also mentioned later. The installation CD contains drivers and also the following: Doom3 EAX patch, Audio Console, Creative MediaSource & DVD-Audio Player, DTS Neo:6, Karaoke Player, Smart Recorder, SoundFont Bank Manager, THX Setup Console, Vienna SoundFont Studio, Console Launcher, Volume Panel, WaveStudio, Creative Media Toolbox, Creative Diagnostics. Drivers and software can be autoupdated via the creative... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful

Advantages: Under XP this is a great souncard for games and musicians.
Disadvantages: Under Vista there have been issues.

...decision when looking for a new sound card. There's a new kid on the block now, described by overclockers.co.uk as 'X-Fi reborn'. It's an Auzentech X-Fi Prelude 7.1 and the name suggests that an association has been made between Creative and another company to produce it. My bottom lip trembles to see this though because, if the Auzentech X-Fi Prelude 7.1 is my card 'reborn' then I must have a card that cost an arm and a leg under a year ago, but that the industry sees as effectively dead. The good news is that these reports of its death are greatly exaggerated. The Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatality FPS is still very much alive and kicking so long as it's running in Windows XP. As all of the functions including hardware acceleration are proving perfectly reliable in that OS, and as the Internet is filled with comparative tables to show... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful

Advantages: Comfortable, excellent audio definition
Disadvantages: lack of manual and software

...Well, after playing F.E.A.R. online for several months i felt that something was lacking. I've been playing with this headset for a few days now and it is extremely comfortable, you can hardly realise you're wearing it. The audio quality is comparable to that in professional DJ equipment. Even myself, with my big ears find that the cups sit comfortably over my entier ear. I can hear people before i see them, the enjoyment that i derive from the game has increased considerably along with my heart rate and the adremaline. The mic is very good, even in a noisy room it picks up only my voice, transmitting it clearly to the rest of the team. The only downside to this headset is the lack of an installation instruction guide, and software. Team speak can be found at http://www.goteamspeak.com/index.php?page=downloads... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful